Trading Across Borders

Doing Business measures the time and cost (excluding tariffs) associated with exporting and importing a standardized cargo of goods by sea transport. The time and cost necessary to complete 4 predefined stages (document preparation; customs clearance and inspections; inland transport and handling; and port and terminal handling) for exporting and importing the goods are recorded; however, the time and cost for sea transport are not included. All documents needed by the trader to export or import the goods across the border are also recorded. The most recent round of data collection for the project was completed in June 2014. Read the methodology.

Use the tabs to view Trading Across Borders data and analysis, reform summaries, frequent questions and related resources. Click on economy name for detailed information. Click on column headers to sort.

About Doing Business

The data and analysis appearing on this page was collected as part of the Doing Business project, which measures and compares regulations relevant to the life cycle of a small to medium-sized domestic business in 189 economies.

The total number of documents required per shipment to export goods. Documents required for clearance by government ministries, customs authorities, port and container terminal authorities, health and technical control agencies and banks are taken into account.

The Cost to export for each year is divided by GDP deflator, to take the general price level into account when benchmarking this absolute-cost indicator across economies with different inflation trends. In Doing Business 2015 the deflated costs are identical to the non-deflated (base year for the deflator).

The total number of documents required per shipment to import goods. Documents required for clearance by government ministries, customs authorities, port and container terminal authorities, health and technical control agencies and banks are taken into account.

The cost to import for each year is divided by GDP deflator, to take the general price level into account when benchmarking this absolute-cost indicator across economies with different inflation trends. In Doing Business 2015 the deflated costs are identical to the non-deflated (base year for the deflator).